BIO
Dr. Theresa Larkin has been a professor in the CSU since 1986, and with the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance at Cal State LA since 1989, where she is a tenured full professor in the combined Department of Music, Theatre, and Dance. Her areas of expertise span a broad spectrum, which include performance training, arts management, social sciences, cultural studies, performance studies, artivist performance, media philosophy, and communications. Academic degrees include the following: BA in Drama and Dance from Loyola Marymount University (1977); MFA in Drama (Specialization: Shakespearean Performance) from U C Irvine (1983); MA and Ph.D. in Cultural Studies (MA Specialization: Cultural Documentary; Ph.D. Specialization: Grassroots Artivism) from Claremont Graduate University (2009 and 2011); Ph.D. dissertation title: The Vismistic Triadic.
Dr. Larkin is an expert in culture, media and performance. Most notably, Shakespearean performance (classical acting), theatre directing (auteur, new works, multi-media art, one-person shows, performance lectures, and classical texts), producing (non-profit theatre, video, film), arts administration (non-profit consulting, management, strategic planning, grants, event planning), voice for the stage (vocal production, IPA, diction, accents and dialects), movement (choreography: modern, period, and folk), cultural studies (cultural documentary, alternative cultural environments,) political theatre (Boalian and Frierian Pedagogy and Theatre of the Oppressed), grassroots activism, and artivism. After a decade long study of activism in the arts, she has devised a performance training technique for grassroots artivists called VISMS, which is a values-centric praxical approach to framing, making, producing, and performing ethical glocal artivism.
During 2012-2014, she devoted time to developing and teaching online courses in theatre arts for the College of Arts and Letters.
Ms. Larkin has received numerous theatre awards for producing and acting, and is responsible for coordinating and conducting hundreds of productions, workshops, staged readings, conferences, symposia, talk backs, and master classes (producing, directing, acting, choreographing, and writing). She founded (and co-founded) non-profit and profit companies, most notably: The Artists' Collective, Theatre for the 21st Century, Latino Classical Repertory (with Tony Plana, et al, now renamed East Los Angeles Theatre Company), and TheatreLife. Profit companies include LioLark Productions and Palar Corporation. In 1988, Theresa served as Associate Artistic Director for Idaho Shakespeare Festival in Boise. Before assuming her professorship at Cal State LA, Theresa spent three years as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the MFA program (Acting / Directing / Voice / Movement) at San Jose State University (1986-89); two years as a Visiting Assistant Professor in the MFA program (Acting / Directing / Voice / Movement) at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale (1984-86); and three years as an Lecturer in Acting at University of California, Irvine (1980-83). She also previously taught English as a Second Language (ESL) for Berlitz, School of Languages (1983-84).
Additionally, Professor Larkin taught at National University (27 years across 17 disciplines), American InterContinental University (AIU) (9 years across 5 disciplines), Springfield College (5 years in Communications, Behavioral Science, Writing and Research), and guest lectured at numerous campuses around the world, including Santa Clara University, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Oberlin College, and Chulalongkorn University (Thailand); among other campuses. She was voted Outstanding Professor twice at AIU (In 2002 for Business and in 2005 for General Education).
For a complete list of courses taught and productions directed since coming to the Cal State system in 1986, please go to http://www.theresalarkin.com
Early career, Ms. Larkin trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, London Contemporary Arts, Shakespeare and Company, and with numerous other specialized training environments in the arts in Hollywood, New York, and London. In the last few years, she has studied film structure and storytelling with James Bonnet, while also being certified in editing techniques in Avid and Final Cut Pro. In previous years, Theresa completed a number of activist and cultural documentaries. Her artistic performance training has been extensive. Modern acting/directing mentors include Robert Cohen, Keith Fowler, Pamela Barnard, Stella Adler, and Virginia Barnelle. Shakespearean performance mentors include George William Needles, Brewster Mason, and medieval scholar Edgar Schell. Dance/Movement/Armed & Unarmed Combat mentors include Mary Lynn Waterman, Donald Hewitt, Charles Edmondson, Teo Morca, Bella Lewitsky, Antoinette Marich, Judy Scalin, B.H. Barry, and Henry Marshall. Voice mentors include Cecily Barry, Patsy Rodenberg, Kristin Linklater, Dudley Knight, and Carla Meyer. As a professional director and actor, Theresa has been a member of the following unions and organizations: Society of Stage Directors and Choreographers, Screen Actors' Guild, Actors' Equity Association, American Federation of Radio and Television Artists, the Royal Society of Art, and the Edinburgh International Fringe Festival. She is also a current member of California Faculty Association.
In 2002, Ms. Larkin was cited by veteran critic Polly Warfield (Dramalogue / Backstage West) as a Living Legend of Los Angeles for her award-winning performance in 1981 as Lu Ann Hampton Laverty Oberlander (in the play Lu Ann Hampton Laverty Oberlander by Preston Jones). Ms. Larkin shares this honor with fellow actor, Jeffrey Meek, for his role as Skip Hampton.
As a conference planner she has worked on a national level for a number years with Association For Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE-founding the Directing Forum in 1985), American Theatre College Festival (ATCF-Regional Festival Adjudicator since 1980), and Center for Theatre of the Oppressed/Applied Theatre Arts/Los Angeles (CTO/ATA/LA) as a founding member, workshop leader, national conference planner, and core conference planner for the international conference held in Hollywood at the Renaissance Hotel (home of the Kodak Theatre) celebrating Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed with colleagues from the CTO/ATA/LA. For four years, Theresa served as Historian/Documentarian for CTO/ATA/LA.
In 2007, Theresa was awarded a proclamation from the County of Riverside for an original multi-media work (co-written with biographer Mary H. Curtin) celebrating Mine' Okubo (Japanese-American internee artist famous for her camp drawings) entitled Mine': A Name For Herself. This production was invited to perform for the Day of Remembrance at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C.
In 2009, Professor Larkin was honored by ACTF with an 'Excellence in Education' Award for 27 years of volunteer service with this national organization housed in the Kennedy Center. The designation celebrates her critical response to countless university productions and for serving as a regional adjudicator and festival judge for nearly three decades at regional festivals held in the Midwestern and Southern United States.
Currently, Dr. Larkin is completing a second Ph.D. at European Graduate School in Saas Fee, Switzerland in Communications and Media Philosophy, with an expected completion date in 2015-2016. The Ph.D. dissertation title is Cancer and the Healing Arts.
During 2015-2016, Theresa is also workshopping a one-woman performance lecture based on her most recent scholarly research and writing on cancer and healing entitled High-Risk.
While completing these new works, she and colleagues are also restructuring the non-profit multi-media theatre company The Artists' Collective for the 2016 Fall Season.
Websites
http://www.theartistscollective.org
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Fall Quarter - 2015
Professor: Theresa Larkin, Ph.D.
Email: tlarkin@calstatela.edu
Office Hours: Friday: 5:30–9:30 pm
Office: Music 243
Office phone: 323-343-4103
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Current Courses
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TA 310
Play Production: Clybourne Park
TA Course 01 - #90791
TBA - Rehearsal
State Playhouse
October 6 – November 22
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TA / TVF 380
Emotions in Theatre and Film
Combined Courses
TA Section 01 - #90386/87
TVF Section 02 - #90509/10
Friday ~ 9:10 am - 1:20 pm
Music Building 256
September 25 - December 12
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TA 467
Praxis: Theory and Method in Performance
TA Section 01 - #90918
Friday ~ 1:30 pm - 5:00 pm
Music Building 111
September 25 – December 12
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LIST OF COURSES TAUGHT
Cal State LA - 1989-2015
TA 100 Play Practicum
TA 141 Acting: Games and Exercises
TA 142 Acting: Character
TA 143 Acting: Scenes
TA 149 Diction and Dialects
TA 152 Analysis of Drama and Theatre*
TA 160 Living Theatre
BCST 210 Body and Identity in Dance, Theatre and Film*
DANCE 210 Body and Identity in Dance, Theatre and Film*
LBS 234 Multicultural Arts in Los Angeles
TA 300 Play Production
TA 300 Production Support
TA 310 Play Production
TA 312 Development of World Theatre II
TA 313 Development of World Theatre III
TA 314 Staging Violence in World Theatre
TA 341 Advanced Acting: Improvisation
TA 343 Playing a Role
TA 348 Movement for Actors
TA 349 Voice for Stage
TAD 349 Breath, Movement, Voice III
TA 357 Creative Experiences
BCST 380 Emotion in Theatre and Film
TA 380 Emotion in Theatre and Film
TVF/T 380 Emotion in Theatre and Film
TA 439 Arts Management
TA 439 Theatre Management
TA 316 Theatre & Dance in 20th Century Urban Environments
TA 398 Cooperative Education
TA 400 Creative Drama - Elementary
TA 401 Adavanced Acting - Classical Theatre
TA 441 Acting Studio I
TA 442 Acting Studio II*
TA 442 Acting Studio III
TA 445 Principles of Directing I
TA 446 Principles of Directing II
TA 447 Acting for Musical Theatre
TA 449 Undergraduate Directed Study
TA 450 Principles of Directing III
TA 454 – L Special Topics – Lecture
TA 454 – P Special Topics – Performance
TA 454 – L Special Topics: Women’s Studies*
TA 457 Emotion in Theatre and Film
TA 459 Hispanic Play Production
SPAN 459 Hispanic Play Production
TA 463 Shakespeare as Living Theatre
TAD 467 Theory and Method in Performance*
COMM 467 Theory and Method in Performance
TAD 467 Praxis: Theory and Practice in Performance
COMM 468 Performance and Social Change
TAD 468 Performance and Social Change
TA 471 Theatre of the Avant-Garde
TA 472 Historical Analysis of Lyric Theatre
TAD 486 Cross-Cultural Approaches to Social Performance
TA 498 Advanced Cooperative Education
TA 499 Undergraduate Directed Study
TVFT 517 Acting for the Stage
TA 511 Special Studies in Theatre History
TA 541 Seminar: Theories of Acting
TVFT 542 Acting Studio*
TVFT 543 Voice for Performers I
COMM 567 Theories of Oral Interpretation
TA 595 Graduate Performance
TA 598 Graduate Directed Study
TA 599 Graduate Project
TA 599 Graduate Thesis
TA 900 Graduate Studies
* Fall 2015 Courses
* Syllabi Prepared